Congress Is Shooting the Messenger

Don't like the message? Shoot the messenger. It worked for pharaohs in ancient Egypt; why not Congress in modern day America?

The pharaoh didn't much flip over a military scout warning of advancing enemy lines, so he killed the scout. The congressional pharaoh didn't much like having his health care reform picked apart, so he killed the guy picking it apart.

It's human nature to recoil at bad news. It's political nature to exact revenge on the folks citing it.

So convinced is the left that their health care reform is right, that not only are all others wrong, but their very opposition means they have committed a wrong. They have dare challenged the pharaoh's view and now they must pay — in the past, with their lives; today, with their reputations.

If they hold a tea party to protest, they're quacks.

Vent their rage at a town hall, they're stooges.

Question the president's agenda, they're racists.

As Bob Dole put it to me on Monday, personally ripping those who oppose your plan doesn't make your plan any more teriffic — just you a little more tragic. Because you can't move the ball on an issue if you keep screwing up the issue and blame others for you not making the case on the issue.

The pharaoh might have thought that by killing the military scout the enemy troops would stop advancing, but they kept advancing just the same. Because what the scout reported from afar was not that far from being a threat.

Same thing for a Congress that dismisses scouts telling them in no uncertain terms, this thing you're advancing is a threat. Ignore them at your peril. Dismiss them at your peril. Besmirch their good name at your peril.

But heed their warnings or you're all but hastening your demise.

It's why we don't have pharaohs, but still have plenty of fools who think they are.